


i'll wander home

by TheDragonofHouseMormont



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Hurt/Comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-20
Updated: 2018-10-20
Packaged: 2019-08-05 01:59:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,587
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16358498
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheDragonofHouseMormont/pseuds/TheDragonofHouseMormont
Summary: Clara and the Doctor investigate a lighthouse that's rumoured to be haunted.





	i'll wander home

**Author's Note:**

> I don't actually know much about lighthouses or Denmark, so sorry if anything is glaringly wrong.
> 
> this is me filling a request from whouffaldi-that-is-all on tumblr, over a year late, because I am the worst. they basically asked for something where the Doctor tries to resuscitate Clara.

The burn begins to ebb, or maybe that’s what Clara wants to believe.  Her vision dims so that water around her appears more like blue static, all the shapes losing their edge.  She doesn’t try to free her arm anymore, having long given up on trying to understand how it got stuck in the first place.  Her lungs weigh her down, like they’re reaching to the seaweed below.  _Maybe I should just let them._

***

Three Days Earlier

Clara had gotten used to the feel of the Tardis landing quite a while ago – the sound, the movement, the sense of simply _being_ somewhere specific.  The console hums beneath her fingers as they come to a landing now, and she taps along it as excitement at the adventure ahead of them sweeps through her.  The Doctor’s curious gaze is on her, she knows, but she isn’t concerned.  As soon as the Tardis touches down, she strides to the front door, heels practically bouncing along the ramp.

The Doctor is on her tail, as curious as she is to see where they’ve landed, even if he doesn’t want to show it as much.  She flings open the door and finds the sight of bright sun, pale sand, and the ocean at low tide greeting them.  He steps out beside her, feet sinking slightly into the sand.  Wetting a finger in his mouth, he sticks it in the air.  “Denmark,” he tells her with a note of surprise.

“Denmark,” she repeats almost like a question, closing the doors as she goes to join him.  “Why Denmark?”

“Why not?”  Though he keeps walking, he falls silent as if in thought.  “I met Hans Christian Anderson once.  Inspired one of his stories.”

Clara almost snorts.  “I’m sure you did.”

“But I don’t think we’ll run into him; this feels much closer to your time than his.”

They walk side by side in the sand, and though Clara tends to walk fast – a habit developed by being short in a world full of people taller than her – she can tell that he’s keeping pace with her, not leaving her behind.  It’s a nice time of year, with only an intermittent breeze blowing past them.

Something catches her attention up ahead.  At first it’s just a tall structure in the distance, but as it takes shape she realizes it’s a lighthouse.  And just as she’s gotten used to knowing when the Tardis lands, Clara thinks that maybe she’s getting the hang of understanding why she sends them where she does, because something about this lighthouse strikes her.  Like it’s important.

***

The lighthouse is bigger than the Doctor had at first expected, but then again he doesn’t spend much of his time considering what’s normal for a lighthouse.  On the other side of it, a little distance away, he can see a small town, which he points out to Clara.  They walk around the lighthouse, which only has one door as far as he can tell, and the door is boarded up.  It has an odd sense to it, like it’s very old, like it’s been witness to more than a lighthouse should.  Maybe.  He still doesn’t know what’s normal for a lighthouse.

The town, though, when they reach it, looks to be what he expects from a small Danish town in the… was it early 21st century?  Yes, very likely the early 21st century, give or take a few years.  There aren’t many people walking the streets.  To Clara’s side he notices a restaurant and through the windows, there seem to be a good few people inside.

It’s not that there’s a guarantee that the Tardis sent them here for a reason and something is about to happen, but the Doctor figures it’s still a good idea to start out by going where the people are.  Just to check in.  Just in case.

He elbows Clara gently and points to the restaurant up ahead.  She doesn’t say anything, just nods, and he wonders if she’s following the same line of thought as him.  Maybe she’s just hungry.

It’s only a little dimmer inside than out.  They take a seat near the window, away from the center of the room.  It’s not completely out of the center of attention, though.  Their status as obvious outsiders has already caught the eye of a few people sitting at the bar.

A man walks up to their booth, a notebook at hand.

“I’ll, uh, I’ll have a hot chocolate,” Clara says.  The Doctor’s pretty sure that her stumbled response was due more to her having not even considered what to order rather than any real desire for a sweet beverage.

But then the server turns to him and he realizes that he hasn’t thought about it either.  “I’ll have the same,” he says quickly.  The man gives him an odd look, but writes it down all the same and walks away.

The other patrons have all gone back to whatever they were doing before he and Clara had walked in.  His back to most of the restaurant, the Doctor watches Clara’s face instead, the way her gaze is seemingly trained on the window, but her attention is clearly on the conversations of those around them.  And he’s listening to them too.

“I told you not to go back there,” he hears someone say in a hushed tone.

The response comes equally hushed, but still too loud in this enclosed space.  “Something needs to be done about that lighthouse before it happens again.”

Clara’s eyes light up at that, and the Doctor’s sure his own face is a reflection of hers.  “Lighthouse, did you say?”  She turns to the speakers seated behind him.  “The one just outside of town?  Are you trying to get it up and running again?”

“No,” the second speaker says, a man.  “It’s running just fine, that’s the problem.”

“What he means to say is,” a woman, the first speaker says, “he and a lot of other people around here think it’s haunted.”

At that, the Doctor turns around to face them.  But it’s Clara who speaks first.  “Oh, well, I was going to say that if you needed help fixing it up, we’re quite good at that sort of thing.”

“Fixing lighthouses?”  The woman questions.

Hand in his pocket, ready to pull out the psychic paper should he need to confirm that they are in any way involved in lighthouse repair, he responds, “Especially haunted ones.  How is it haunted?”

“Well, lighthouses don’t typically operate themselves, do they?”

“We don’t want it repaired,” the man interrupts.  “We want it destroyed.  The last time that thing started lighting up on its own, it killed a girl.”

“I’m sorry to hear that,” Clara says.  The Doctor turns back to her, catching the glint in her eye, small enough that only he can see it.  It’s a kind that he’s recorded in his notebook somewhere, interpreted.  And like so many things that pass between them, he’s sure he has some mirroring expression, some look that she catches that tells her what he’s forming in his mind.  A plan.

***

As the sun sinks below the horizon, Clara tries to keep her eyes open.  It’s not that she’s sleepy, exactly, but that she and the Doctor have been sitting here in silence for the better part of an hour.  She’s afraid to so much as move and alert anyone or anything that might have taken up residence in the lighthouse.  She peeks over the side of the rock to watch if anyone is on the beach, but it’s just as empty as it was when they arrived.

Will it really be haunted?  The last time she and the Doctor intentionally went ghost-hunting, they found a deteriorating pocket dimension, an odd yet unexpectedly romantic creature, and a woman trying to get home to her own time.  It was an experience she’d rather not repeat.  Too close of a call.

The dark grows around them, but still they don’t move.  Clara wants to stand up, walk around, do something, but she doesn’t want to risk it.  Beside her she can feel the Doctor fidgeting.  She places her hand on top of his in an attempt to help calm him.

Before she can say anything, a light shines on the ground in front of her, a meter or two from her feet, before moving away.  She leans against the rock again, peeking around it.  Sure enough, the light in the lighthouse is active, even though they never saw anyone approach.  “Is it possible we missed—”

There’s a loud sound, like the air getting sucked out of a room.  She and the Doctor both jump up at once, startled.  Something’s happening not too far out at sea, but it isn’t a passing ship.  The Doctor grabs her hand and then walks out from behind the rock, pulling her with him.  Above the waves, what looks like a small rip in the air has opened.

“It’s a rift,” the Doctor whispers.

And now it looks more like a haunting.  Something almost transparent, like a ghost, steps through the rift before disappearing.  And then another one, and another one.  After about a minute no one else comes through and the rift closes like it had never been there in the first place.

Clara can only hear the waves.  Everything is still dark, illuminated only by the lighthouse and the small sliver of moon.  She grasps the Doctor’s hand a little tighter.

They wait, but nothing else comes.  After a few hours, the lighthouse goes dark once more.  They don’t see anyone leave it.

***

When Clara steps out into the console room, the Doctor is already staring intently at something on the screen.  Did he even sleep?  Probably not.  As for herself, she’s pretty sure she slept a little too long, but in her defense they had returned just before sunrise.  “What’re you looking at?”

It’s a second or two before he glances up at her.  “I went back to the lighthouse this morning and scanned it.”  He pushes the screen so it swings in her direction.  “I’m trying to figure out how someone could have gotten in without us noticing.”

“Not a fan of the ghost theory, then?”

“Well, I’d love to be surprised, but every ghost we’ve encountered so far has turned out to be something else.”

Her eyes scan over the screen.  “So the question is, will this be ‘just trying to escape a collapsing pocket dimension’ ghost situation, or a ‘murdering people to strengthen a signal’ one.”

“Have you noticed it yet?” he asks, just as her eyes catch on a dark spot in the bottom floor.

“That spot there, it’s a trapdoor, isn’t it?  I’m assuming it goes to a cellar or something.  Except…”  She tries to move below it, pull up any images of a sublevel to the building.  “I’m going to assume you didn’t just forget to scan below the lighthouse.”

“No, I didn’t forget.  But the trapdoor shows up on the scan because there is some sort of open space below it.  If it is a room, it’s not that big.  More likely scenario – it isn’t a room.  It’s a—”

“It’s a passage.”  She looks up and away from the screen, just now noticing that he’s moved to stand right in front of her.

“Yes, my thoughts exactly.  And a narrow one at that.  Another question: where does it lead?”

“And who’s using it?”  There’s a smile growing on her face, she knows.  She can’t help it.  “So, what do we do?  Break into the lighthouse, follow the passage?”

“No,” he says simply, a smile to match hers.

“No?”

“For all we know, that passage leads nowhere informative – using it could spook whoever’s been operating the lighthouse.  Not to mention, your first question is by far the most important one.  Harmless or harmful?”  He moves away from her again, pulling the screen with him.  “This lighthouse activity has been going on for a while now, the town is afraid of it, and last night we watched several unknown beings come out of the sky through a rift.  We know someone died there, but we don’t know who or how or why.  We need more information on what’s happening before we can decide what to do.”

***

Apparently ‘more information’ meant hiding outside the lighthouse for a second night in a row.  It’s chillier than the night before and Clara pulls her jacket tighter.  She tucks herself against the rock, trying to keep the wind out of her hair.  Next to her, the Doctor takes a deep breath.  Everything is silent apart from the wind.

A light traces along the ground in front of her, and she watches the wind pick up grains of sand in the illumination.  A minute passes, two, but she doesn’t hear anything like the sky opening.  She leans her head on the Doctor’s shoulder, closing her eyes, promising herself she won’t fall asleep.  She’s not sure if she does; it only feels like a moment later when the Doctor jumps beneath her cheek, startling her.  Her eyes snap open just as he launches to his feet, and she has to throw down her hands to keep from falling.

“I heard the front door open,” he whispers as an apology, hovering where he stands, caught between running to the lighthouse and waiting.  He offers his hand to her, pulling her to her feet, before the former impulse finally prevails and he takes off.

His legs are longer, but Clara puts all her effort into keeping as a close as possible, skidding to a halt just as he does.  The Doctor leans against the lighthouse, peering around it.  Clara grabs onto his waist, using him as an anchor so she can peer around as well.  She catches sight of someone not too far away, a young woman walking down to the waterline.

Something rises up from the water about fifteen feet from shore, the moonlight not enough to illuminate what.  The young woman walks toward it, entering the water without hesitation, walking like nothing was out of the ordinary, with only the force of the water slowing her pace as any indication that she was walking in the ocean at all.

Clara steps forward, ready to run after the woman, to do something, but the Doctor holds her back.  “Wait,” he breathes.

The thing in the water rises higher, and Clara can finally make out the shape of it in the moonlight.  A person, another woman, long, wet hair sticking to her skin.  She holds out her arms and the woman from the shore steps into the embrace.  For a moment Clara still worries that something sinister might happen, but then she sees them kiss.  The woman from the shore pulls the woman from the ocean to slightly shallower water and then sits down, the waves lapping at her waist.

***

“So, probably not evil then.”  Clara wraps the blanket around her body before taking a seat across from the Doctor in the library.

“No, probably not.”  He doesn’t look up at her entrance, his gaze on the floor as he thinks.

“What if it’s just a lighthouse?” she muses.

“Yes,” he replies, seemingly automatically, but then he finally looks up at her.  “I’ve been considering that as well.  Last night, with the rift, perhaps those beings were just following the light of the lighthouse, drawn to it somehow.”

“But whoever came tonight, the woman from the lighthouse clearly knew her.  A repeat visitor, maybe?”  Clara takes a breath, thinking.  “And there’s still the death they talked about in town to be accounted for.  If the lighthouse is guiding travelers of different kinds, could it be possible that it’s drawn something bad here as well?”

“Quite possible.  But we still don’t know that for certain.  The best way to find out is to ask, so you better get some sleep, we’ve got a long night ahead of us.”

***

This time, they do not approach cautiously.  The Tardis materializes on the second floor and the Doctor steps out, the wooden floorboards creaking beneath his boots.  The sun has only just gone down, and there’s the faintest glow keeping the room from sinking into total darkness.  Clara follows behind him, and he holds a finger to his lips, trying not to smile at the roll of her eyes.  Of course, she doesn’t need the reminder, but old habits and all that.

He walks slowly to the stairs and kneels down, Clara beside him a second later.  In the dark, it’s difficult to see, but he can just make out the outline of the trapdoor in the floor below them.

It opens.

And up climbs a young woman – the one they had glimpsed the night before – boots stepping heavily on the stairs leading into the lighthouse proper.  She doesn't turn on any lights, doesn't look around.  Habit has clearly formed all her movements in this moment, night after night spent in exactly the same way. 

Just as she reaches the first step leading up to them, the Doctor calls out, "Who are you?"

Clara wants to lay her forehead in her hand at the absurd simplicity of such a question, unsure what would make him ask it.  Was it the unexpected sight of so harmless-looking a person?  They had agreed earlier that what was happening probably wasn't evil, but plenty harmless-looking beings have been harmful in the past.

The girl quickly glances up at them, confusing filling her features.  Confusion, but not fear.  "I might ask you the same thing," she replies forcefully.  "How did you get in here?"

"Magic," the Doctor tells her before turning back to Clara.  "We were right, Clara, it is a secret passage."  He turns back to the young woman again.  "What's your name?"

"Agnes," she tells them, voice nearly welcoming.

"This is the Doctor, I'm Clara," she gives in return.  "Are you the one that turns on the light every night?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

"It's my responsibility."

"Did you know the town thinks this place is haunted?" the Doctor brings up.  "And not in a good way.  They say a girl died here once."

"That girl was my sister, and it isn't what you think."

"It rarely is."

Seemingly unperturbed by their line of questioning, Agnes resumes walking up the stairs toward them.  "If you don't mind, I do have a job to do."

The Doctor nods, stepping aside as she approaches.  "And we don't mean to get in the way of that, it's just that my ship brought us we when I didn't expect her to, and that's rarely ever a sign of anything other than danger."

"You're forgetting one thing," Agnes says as she continues up the steps, heading now to the third floor.  "This is a lighthouse.  Why wouldn't your ship be drawn here?"

"You seem strangely okay with the strange things he's said in the past couple of minutes," Clara points out.

Agnes stops mid step and turns to face them.  "There are plenty of strange things here, and none of them really seem strange anymore.  If we're going to have this conversation, then you may as well follow me."  Clara and the Doctor glance at each other, and then follow as Agnes requested.  "There have been stories of hauntings here for as long as I can remember, going back generations at least, but the truth is this place really is just a lighthouse.  It's a lighthouse for things passing through the rift as much as for ships sailing past.  A lot of traffic passes through here."

"Are there others like it?" Clara asks, wondering what things might be hidden on her own world.

"Maybe, I'm not sure.  All I know is that my family have been secretly operating this one for a long time.  The last keeper was my sister.  Her death was just an accident, by the way.  The sea can be very unforgiving."  Having arrived at the top of the lighthouse, Agnes starts up the light.

The Doctor stares down at her, and Clara can see how he tries to summon a small air of authority.  "The people in town seem quite upset about the continued operation of the lighthouse.  They attribute it to the death of your sister, and maybe more bad occurrences."

Agnes doesn't appear bothered.  "Like I said, they've always claimed this place was haunted."  She leads them back down inside, and Clara wonders if there's a particular task she has in mind or if Agnes is afraid to be seen by any curious onlookers.

"And like _I said,_ " the Doctor interjects as they head down the stairs.  "My ship probably brought us here for a reason.  I've learned not to underestimate vitriol in large groups."

Agnes spins to face him, feet flat on the landing of the third floor.  "They've never tried anything before," she exclaims, right hand gesturing outward toward the quiet that surrounds them.  "What would–"

A shout, distant, interrupts them.  Clara moves to one of the windows to see what's going on, but Agnes is already rushing down the stairs to the ground floor.  Did she hear something they didn't?  Does she know something they don't?  Whatever caused her to bolt, the Doctor has chosen to follow, so Clara does as well, keeping up just behind him.

By the time they reach the bottom floor, the front door is already wide open.  Past the entrance, the first thing Clara notices is that there are people in the water.  In the dark it's difficult to discern what's happening, but it resembles something of a struggle.

That's when the yelling cuts into her attention, and she glances to the side.  Still on shore, Agnes is being held back by a man that Clara recognizes from the restaurant in town.  Agnes is shouting, "Let me go!"  Her feet kick through the sand below her, failing to find purchase.

"It needs to be stopped," the man shouts back to her in what he probably thinks is a soothing voice.

Clara watches the Doctor run to Agnes' aid.  She makes a decision – divide and conquer, and all that – and runs straight ahead to the water instead.  The moment Clara's legs hit the shallow waves, she feels overwhelmed with cold, but she keeps running.  The closer she gets to the group of people, the better she can assess the situation.  It's the same woman from the night before, the one Agnes went into the water to greet.  Now that woman is fighting to keep hands off her, the people from town trying to catch what they think is a monster.

"Stop," Clara yells at them, getting closer.  "It's not what you think!"  The water's up to her chest now, her short legs slowing down against the current.

The woman grabs hold of the nearest person; he looks young.  Before Clara can even try to call out to her as well, to argue that they don't understand, that they aren't any more monstrous than she is, the woman pulls him under the waves, a hand around his neck.

A couple of surrounding people dive under to find them.  The water's already up to Clara's neck, lapping at her chin, so she ducks under as well, figures she'll be faster that way.  Under the water, the darkness thicker, but Clara swims forward.  She can see movement up ahead and works her way toward it.  As she gets closer, she sees what looks like a fishtail, but the size and length of nearly two-thirds of her own body.  Panic threatens to bubble up, but she ignores it.

Once she's close enough to reach out and touch the tail, she does so, noticing another human hand near her own.  She peels that hand off of scales, and kicks out toward whoever owns it, hopes that it forces them to make for the surface.

There's another human body to her left, and she reaches out for them, whoever they are.  She wraps her arms around their stomach and pulls backward, but the kick at her, scratch at her arms.

Maybe they're the reason she gets stuck.  Maybe it's one of the other people that dropped below the waves to aid their friend.  Clara doesn't know who it is or how it happens, all she knows is that something relaxes inside of her when she sees the sea-woman swim away safely into the depths.  All she knows is that the other humans around her seemingly each make their way to the surface.  All she knows is that her arm is stuck, held in place by a rock or a pole or something else that she can't quite make out in the dark.

She pulls and pulls until she doesn't have the energy anymore, until panic is the only thing left.

***

There's a burning first, in her lungs.  Second is the water rolling down her cheek, and she can hear herself coughing.  Third is the feeling of sand beneath her back, of large hands on her shoulders.  Clara opens her eyes and the only thing she can see is the Doctor looking back, his face taking up every corner of her vision.  His hair is wet and his jacket is nowhere in her limited field of sight.  There's water dripping from her onto him, and when she looks at his eyes she thinks it might be more than just the ocean.  There's panic in his eyes, a pure fear, and, maybe, an inkling of hope.

Clara wants to say something, but opening her mouth just leads to more coughing, so she reaches up with tired arms, grabbing his shoulders in turn, and pulls him down to her.  His chest falls to hers as he buries his face in her neck.  She wraps her arms around his back, and in her lack of strength, just lays them there, knowing somehow that he won't move away just yet.

She realizes, then, what she nearly lost.  Not just her life – she puts that in danger on a regular basis – but this, the Doctor, the best friend she's ever had, the one person who accepts her for everything, and the silence she knows they'll both have to navigate one day.

"I'm sorry," she manages to whisper.

The Doctor pulls back just enough to look her in the eye.  "I'm just glad you're okay," he says to her softly, because he might forgive her, but he's too afraid of her doing it again to say so out loud.

After a minute, he sits up all the way, pulling her with him.  Clara leans her head on his arm, staring at the scene around them.  Agnes is standing on the shore, the waves lapping at her ankles.  The people from town are still there as well, looking at Clara and the Doctor almost mournfully.  She doesn't know how long she was out, but she feels like she missed a lot.

Behind Agnes, out in the ocean, Clara is sure she can see a woman's head poking up through the waves, watching from a safe distance.

***

It's a few hours later, the sun rising just above the horizon, dawn scattering across the floorboards of the lighthouse through the open front door, that the interrupted conversation from earlier seems to resume.

"The Tardis is very good at sniffing out danger," the Doctor says.

Agnes smiles at him, then at Clara.  "Or maybe she just saw the lighthouse and wanted to help guide you home."


End file.
